Proposal for Civil Decorations Categories: Initial Review [closed]

Question

This post is the initial review (step 2) for a proposal concerning the Civil Decorations categories. The proposal has two parts:

• That the categories for Civil Decorations are contained in a separate category stream to the Military Decorations category stream,
• That a naming standard is established for individual Civil Decoration categories.

Full details of the proposal are on the proposal page.

Please post any questions or comments below. 

Thanks for reading.

Margaret Haining, Project Coordinator, Categorization Project.

Comments

Hi Margaret,

Three comments for you to consider:

• For some reason the England/UK team have their categories in the plural, which is confusing.  WHY? As Australia uses these categories, would you see Australia creating their own sub category, and how would these be differentiated from the U.K categories already in existence. Should be singular in my opinion. e.g. Commanders of the Order of the British Empire in lieu of Commander of the Order of the British Empire
• There is crossover where the same award in both military, for some profiles, and civil in other cases. e.g. Order of the British Empire.
• In most categories, the parent categories are at the end of the sub category.  Yoiu have placed the parent at the beginning of the category.  Why this inconsistency?  e.g. Forbes, New South Wales, not New South Wales, Forbes.  Unit, Branch, Conflict, not Conflict, Branch, Unit.  So the Categories, IMHO, should be Cilvil Decorations, Australia and Military Decorations, Australia

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Hi Craig, thanks for the suggestions, I'll answer in the same order:

1. You'll find those types of categories are correctly named in the plural, see Category Names, same as Australia, Governors-General (plural).

2. That was discussed under Stephen's answer below and updated on the proposal page. Those categories remain as is, with both civil and military parent categories, (as they currently have).

3. In most categories, the parent categories are at the end of the sub category.  Yoiu have placed the parent at the beginning of the category. Why this inconsistency?

This is a strange one, I've never seen that documented anywhere as a category naming convention. The format "<country>, Civil Decorations" and "<country>, Military Decorations" follows the "Location, Theme" category naming standard, as do many, many categories on WikiTree. Have a look at the category Australia, you'll find 47 of the 65 categories named in that format. As well as the state sub-categories of some of those and another 116 under Australia, Occupations. You'll find the same under other country categories.

As each of the country categories (Australia, xxxxx Decorations) will have 2 parent categories, Australia and Civil (or Military) Decorations, I don't know how you would go about picking which parent "went at the end of the category name"? Sounds like chaos to me.

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Thanks for the reply Margaret,

We will agree to disagree on answer one, as the individal is not awarded the Members of the Order of the British Empire, and a person is not appointed a Governers General.  I will continue to think that is stupid and wrong naming, but happy to be in the majority.

I do not understand any of your reasoning for the third question's answer.

Surely the category, Australia, is the parent in your example, Australia, Civilian Decorations, as is the New South Wales in Forbes, New South Wales.  It really is about consistency, either the parent category (Australia) is first or last in ALL sub categories.  As parents are identified in the sub-category (by adding the parent category) the the order is not of consequence, except for the user, especially this useer, who is constantly caught out by one category having the parent category first, and the next category stating the parent category after the smaller sub category definition.  

If we were to extend the Locality, Theme standard to all categories, then

• Cemeteries would become:
  • New South Wales, Rookwood, Rookwood General Cemetery
• Towns/Suburbs/Locatities would become:
  • Victoria, Sebastipol
  • New South Wales, Lithgow

but these are overwritten by their own standard.

I guess what I am saying is the Location, Theme standard is absolute Rubbish, as it takes its standard as the opposite of other standards. (Cemetery, Location, Structure) and therefore causes confusion, especially for me.  I don't doubt your numbers, but the logic of the policy defeats me.  ( And I have written ISO standards.) 

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Craig, I've given you the link to the category naming page, that covers plurals and naming conventions. Locations have approved naming conventions, cemeteries have an approved naming convention, military categories have an approved naming convention, our Australian shipping categories have an approved naming convention (the only shipping categories that do), "location, theme" is an approved naming convention.

These are not "my" category naming standards, they are published WT standards. If you have any issues with the category naming conventions, I suggest you take it up in a separate G2G post.

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Thanks Margaret, But that would be a waste of time.

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I just thought someone else might be able to explain it better than me and the help page, but I'll have another crack.

Plurals: So "Order of the British Empire" is the award, it has a category. Then we have the sub-categories for the classes of recipients, like Members, so the description for that category would be " a category for profiles of people who are Members (plural) of the Order of the British Empire", it contains multiple members, not just one, same with the Governors-General, and say, Australia, Actors, the category contains multiple people of a set or group, not just one "Member of the Order of the British Empire".

Locations: Location categories are just that, locations, they don't have a "theme", or lets call it a "topic". Cemeteries have a cemetery name and a location, no topic. Same with churches. Ships have a ship name and arrival date, no topic. Military units have a unit name , branch name, conflict name, no topic.. Categories like "Australia, Projects" and "Australia, Immigration" and "Victoria, Cemeteries" and "Tasmania, Religious Congregations" and "Queensland, Politicians" all have a Location and a theme or topic, so are all named in the "<location>, <topic>" format. As is "Australia, Military Decorations".

Hope that helped, otherwise I guess I'm done.

Answer 1

Thank you for tackling this issue, Margaret.

How would we deal with the British Orders of Chivalry and Knights Bachelor, which have morphed from being military awards in England to civilian awards in the United Kingdom?

Comments

Hi Stephen, thanks for the question, the main plank of this proposal is to separate the current military decorations from the civil, primarily those under UK, Military Decorations.

Currently, UK has 2 categories under Awards and Honors, this one and this one, I know that these were extensively reviewed by the joint UK teams, and those you mentioned would just stay as is, where is. 

Under the proposal, there would be a category, say "United Kingdom, Civil Decorations", and under that would be all those in those two categories, minus what's currently under "UK, Military Decorations". Those two existing categories could both be under "UK, Civil Decorations" if you wanted to still keep the two separate categories. I'm sure all the individual decoration categories under there would have been looked at for naming accuracy when you did the re-organization.

So, for example:

• United Kingdom, Civil Decorations
  • Decorations and Medals of British Isles and Ireland
    • Existing individual decorations categories 
  • Honours and Awards of British Isles and Ireland
    • Existing individual decorations categories 

 If you didn't necessarily want to keep the 2 existing separate, then:

• United Kingdom, Civil Decorations
  • Existing individual decorations categories.

The "UK, Military Decorations" and it's current sub-categories, would be in the separate Military category stream.

Hope that all makes sense!

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I can't promise that we checked all of the individual decoration categories. The exercise was mainly about untangling circular references and introducing some consistency. We also tried to use the term "British Isles and Ireland" rather than "United Kingdom", partly because of confusion and sensitivity as to whether it meant "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland" (1801-1922) or "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" (1922-present); and to include the Isle of Man and Channel Islands, which have never been part of the United Kingdom but share some of the institutions. So "United Kingdom" should be a sub-category of "British Isles and Ireland", rather than vice versa.

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I like the standardisation of the description of the higher level categories as "Civil Decorations, [Country]" 

I agree with Stephen that "British Isles and Ireland" (geographical description) should be used as a top-level category, with United Kingdom as a sub-category where appropriate for the time frame. (In much the same way as the Nobility of the British Isles and Ireland reorganisation took place last year).

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Orders such as the Order of the Bath and  Order of the British Empire are still awarded in Military and Civilian Divisions. (Just checked a recent list) 

Will  this result in two categories for each award? 

 Some individuals  have several honours awarded  in both divisions over their lifetime. I'm not sure how many profile creators  will check the London Gazette to find out which division is applicable.

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Hi Stephen and Jo, sorry for delay in replying, I think we only have a small window of time when both our countries are up and about 

The top level country category [[Category:<country>, Civil Decorations]] could be "British Isles and Ireland, Civil Decorations" if that was your preference, no problem. I think I only suggested "United Kingdom" as the parent country category is United Kingdom.

To be consistent, the military decorations one could also be "British Isles and Ireland, Military Decorations" ?

What about the two existing categories that will go under the top level one? Do you still want those as separate sub categories? 

• British Isles and Ireland, Civil Decorations
  • Decorations and Medals of British Isles and Ireland
    • Existing individual decorations categories 
  • Honours and Awards of British Isles and Ireland
    • Existing individual decorations categories 

OR

• British Isles and Ireland, Civil Decorations
  • Existing individual decorations categories.

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There would have to be an agreement in the British Isles and Ireland categories working group for the sub-cats, but as a top level "British Isles and Ireland, Civil Decorations" works for us.

Decorations and Medals of British Isles and Ireland

and

Honours and Awards of British Isles and Ireland

would disappear, but there would need to be a sub level for the various political entities of the combinations of the home nations and Crown Dependencies of the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands (as per the British Isles and Ireland Nobility structure). United Kingdom and Ireland (1801-1922), United Kingdom and Northern Ireland (post 1922) would be two of those categories.

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@Helen Ford - re the Civil and Military lists for the same honour. It's a tricky one, and will take a bit of thinking of how we can wrangle it.

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@Helen, @Jo, thanks for bringing up those situations, just a quick look at those two you mentioned, the British Empire Medal looks to be predominately a military decoration, it's already included under the UK Military decorations category. However, I totally agree that having 2 categories is not the answer, will cause more problems for no reason.

How about an alternate idea, that it has both parent categories, "B I & I, Civil Decorations", and B I & I, Military Decorations? That way, it's still listed under both, but the main objective, that is, disconnecting the 2 structures so that the vast majority of "civil" categories are not inadvertently caught up in any future proposal, designed to address the issues with military decorations, would still be in place.

I wouldn't see the Order of the Bath in the same way, although it's given to military personnel, I don't see it as coming under the remit of military decorations, I wouldn't think M&W would see it that way. I don't think it needs to change where it is, what do you think? 

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Further to that, British Empire Medal has been set up as an M&W category, (I think the 2 parent idea is the way to go there), but Order of the Bath is not set up as an M&W category.

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I think the only reason that Decorations and Medals were separated from Honours and Awards of the British Isles and Ireland was that was how the parent categories were organised. Your proposal, Margaret, would remove the need for that distinction.

I see no problem with individual decorations having both military and civilian parents.

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Thanks for that, Stephen.

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Are we meaning two parents for one category or two categories, one with each parent? If the former, theres no problem.

(Sorry if I'm being thick, I don't usually get involved in the minutiae of categorisation.)

Its certainly inconsistent to have BEM under one parent and MBE under another. Both are/were awarded in civil and military divisions

[[Category:Members of_the_Order_of_the_British_Empire]]  will almost certainly  contain a mix of recipients in both  divisions.

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Helen, yes, we're talking about British Empire Medal being the one category as it is now, but with 2 parent categories, as it does now, except they'll be named slightly differently, "British Isles and Ireland, Civil Decorations" and "British Isles and Ireland, Military Decorations".

There may be some others as well, that can be identified as the same. I'd say they would be like BEM and be set up as a Military & War medal but also have a civil division.

No, you're definitely not being thick, unless you ask questions you can't be sure what exactly is being meant. Thanks for taking the time to provide input.

Answer 2

Orders, Decorations and Medals of Canada category currently has Canada: Military Decorations as a sub-category. Other awards that are civil in nature fall under the parent category, by province where applicable.  

If I follow your proposal correctly, Military decorations would be moved out of that entirely and set up as a separate structure?

Comments

Hi Danielle, yes that's right, Military Decorations already has a structure, under Military, you'll see numerous country categories, including Canada. Currently, as you said, the military decorations category for the country is part of the Awards and Honors structure by the fact it is a sub category of the country category in that structure.

Therefore the civil categories in this structure, could be inadvertently caught up in any proposal to address the issues with military decorations. 

So, under this proposal, the existing "Orders, Decorations and Medals of Canada" would become "Canada, Civil Decorations", it would contain the 8 existing categories for civil decorations, and there would be a link on the category page to "Canada, Military Decorations"  (and vice versa). See this one as an example. 

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so basically this is not affecting the landing level categories as such but only their parent categories, with structure of mid-level categories shifting around?  I have no problem with that, will ask Canada project leaders to take a look at this discussion for their input.

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Danielle, that's right, those 8 landing level categories already existing, stay exactly the same, same names, just a slightly different named parent category, "Canada, Civil Decorations", which is more in line as well with the WT standard of "Location, Theme".

"Canada, Military Decorations" stays exactly the same, with all it's same sub-categories, with parent categories of "Canada" and "Military Decorations". That then means, that when discussions happen about the military decorations, the civil decorations categories aren't affected.

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This makes sense to me. Best to separate Order of Canada and other such awards from the military ones. And as you say, it doesn't affect the landing level categories.

Answer 3

Why?

Surely, for WikiTree Categorisation purposes, it makes no difference whether a decoration was bestowed under its Civilian or Military Division. Write it up in the Bio.  In the Army, we were constantly being reminded of KISS - Keep It Simple Stupid.  Are we talking here yet another example of members requiring an academic degree in order to locate a Category?

I fail to see any present confusion, or potential for such. Leave it alone, please.

Comments

Hi Ken, is it possible you may be mis-understanding the reason for the proposal and what will be happening to the landing level categories?

Categories like British Empire Medal that have both civil & military, are not being changed in any way, shape or form. That category will still exist as a single category, with exactly the same name. It will still come up the same in the category picker, it will still be called exactly the same name, it will have 2 parent categories, as it currently does, although one will be named slightly differently.

The only changes are to parent categories that will be named in line with WT "Location, Theme" naming convention. The categories with the profiles are not changing, (unless they happen to be incorrectly named).

What aspect of the proposal do you see as making it "harder to locate a category"?